New Bird Flu Fear: Worker Shortage

February 6, 2012 by John Reichard Congressional Quarterly

When a scientific team in the Netherlands last year developed a strain of the H5N1 “bird flu” virus that may be highly transmissible from human to human, experts feared that terrorists or even Mother Nature could achieve the same results.

The development put H5N1, which for several years had slipped off the radar screen, back into public view. During the George W. Bush administration, fear of the flu prompted the government to spend billions to improve and expand treatment supplies and to prepare state and federal “pandemic” plans.